


The Triumvirate

by Praemonitor



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, F/M, Minisodes, R plus L equals J, Starklings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-24
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-07-26 06:37:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7564030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Praemonitor/pseuds/Praemonitor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If you didn't die in the game of thrones, you must've won. Non-chronological ‘minisodes’ set before, during, and after a newfound Targaryen Triumvirate and their allies face ramifications of victory. [ Gendrya and Jonerys share the spotlight. Please be forewarned that R + L = J. ]</p>
<p>Minisode I - Jonerys / Canon divergence, where they meet in Winterfell instead of Dragonstone.<br/>Minisode II - Gendrya / Cutesy snippet I like to call, "Tell me what the Lord's Kiss is."<br/>Minisode III - Gendrya and Jonerys / Dany learns who exactly Gendry is, and it ends better than you'd think.<br/>Minisode IV - Gendrya / Rediscovering the lost art of Valyrian steel, subtitled "Excuse for Gendrya forge scenes."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. When the Wall Fell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm incredibly nervous to share my writing in the _Game of Thrones_ fandom. You all are my fanfic idols, and I'm not worthy. :) What follows are fragmented wish-fulfillment minisode(s), without definitive plot-like direction, update schedule, or overarching purpose.
> 
> These drabbles are an outlet for me to weather the _Thrones_ hiatus in a healthy (if not entirely constructive) manner, considering all my hopes and dreams came true in Season 6. If you like 'em, I'll write 'em; if not, I'll stop here, no harm, no foul, and go back to lurking behind the scenes!
> 
> Please note, each minisode(s) is set randomly before, during, and/or after the hypothetical, but inevitable war I like to call Dragons vs. Ice Zombies: the Series. In the words of a far greater artist than I, you're about to navigate 'a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff.' Godspeed. **Major spoilers for anything and everything _Game of Thrones._**
> 
> Disclaimer: I don't own it.

**Minisode I:**  
**When the Wall Fell**

Dany hated that she couldn’t hate him.

She tried to hate him — gods, did she try — because Jon Snow was a rival Targaryen claimant to the Iron Throne. A dragon raised by wolves, brave and gentle and strong, Prince Rhaegar’s son, her only family.

_I have a nephew._

She should kill him. 

Win or die, according to western diplomacy, and she was in Westeros now.

By all accounts, before her landfall upon northern shores, Jon was winning. He didn’t need dragons or Dothraki or Unsullied or the Greyjoy armada. Winterfell was his, utterly and completely, with undying support from a fearsome family. He commanded Northmen and wildlings and Vale knights, loyal to the last. When Littlefinger sought to pit wolf against wolf, sister against brother, Sansa against Jon, he failed in spectacular fashion. When the Dragon Queen encroached upon their homeland, the Starks rallied with fervor. Jon soundly defeated Grey Worm in hand-to-hand combat, rivaling the late Ser Barristan with a sword. He was the King in the North, undisputed, unquestioned, never mind whose bastard he was. Jon rose from the dead like a prophecy made real, a song of ice and fire, the prince who was promised, yet kindness and humility prevailed.

And his smile, rare and precious, made her feel as she hadn’t since Drogo.

Only stories remained of her eldest brother, painting Rhaegar in flattering light: the handsome prince, honorable, honest, peaceful though melancholy. Dany struggled to envision such a thing, because Viserys was a hateful and violent basis for comparison.

Jon Snow was everything Viserys wasn’t. Just like Rhaegar.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

The scariest thing about Jon Snow wasn’t his wolfsblood, or his brooding, or his kingship, or his Valyrian longsword. It wasn’t even the White Walkers that hunted him or his half-Targaryen temper, which reared its ugly head whenever somebody whispered Frey or Bolton within earshot.

The scariest thing about Jon Snow was his family.

His sisters were ruthless she-wolves, one a political mastermind, the other a faceless assassin, and his brother an omniscient oracle. When winter comes, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Now that winter had arrived with vengeance, those Starklings were violently protective of their big brother.

_Cousin._ But nobody dared correct them.

Bran didn’t realize how terrifying he looked when skinchanging, eyes glazed white, soul far gone, and Arya swapped faces more readily than most ladies swapped gowns. But despite the Three-Eyed Raven and a Faceless Man lurking about Winterfell, it was Sansa of whom Dany was most wary. Sansa was subtly dangerous, like sweet poison. While Littlefinger thought _he_ manipulated _her,_ she played the player of players, reminding the world that those who'd harm Jon will die screaming. Dany saw herself in Sansa, a newborn khaleesi finding her footing, testing her power, and the reflection was humbling.

The Lady of Winterfell was also first to notice Dany’s gaze lingering too long upon the King in the North, especially when his back was turned, or dark curls framed his face, or his jerkin hung open to stitch and bind wounds.

Jon was a beautiful man, and his sister was neither blind, nor stupid. In a dark corridor, she seized the khaleesi by her elbow. “Touch him," warned Sansa Stark, "and not even dragonflame will thaw your corpse.”

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Jon Snow knew more than he let on.

Sometimes, after battle plans were drawn and supper served and the hearth reduced to embers, she caught him staring from across the Small Council, though never lewd or carnal. Something innocent, something pure. Curiosity, perhaps.

And why shouldn’t he be curious? The man lived an unintended lie his entire life — "You must be Ned Stark’s bastard." — only to discover his father was his uncle, his siblings were his cousins, and he was a prince. For better or worse, Dany always knew who she was and still descended into abject wonderment upon meeting another Targaryen.

_I'm not alone._

And Jon Snow was never alone either, not anymore, keeping constant company with his doting sisters or Ser Davos or that albino wolf. Only once, Dany ran across the King in the North unguarded in the Godswood. He sat beneath the sacred weirwood near a glassy-black pool, eying his mirror image like a stranger, and didn’t notice her until a second Targaryen reflection appeared alongside his own.

Jon startled. “Khaleesi." He still pronounced it wrong. "Forgive me, I didn't see— ”

"Daenerys," she offered, unsure if he'd accept, "but my family called me Dany." At least, Viserys did; that was the one and only thing she missed about him.

Jon blinked at her once, twice, before his features softened, and he made up his mind. "Dany." That northern dialect cuffed its two syllables, his voice gruff and deep, but nothing would ever bring her joy equal to his perpetual butchering of 'khaleesi.'

Dany sat beside him in the snow and stared down their reflections in the ink-black pond. No two people had ever looked more different. His salvation, she knew; that Starkness was a blessing in more ways than one. “Please don’t hate who you really are.” She gestured at herself, pale eyes and silver-blonde. “Only half our family’s mad.”

He laughed. She’d never heard him laugh. It was even prettier than his smile. His eyes crinkled, and he shed ten years. Was that Rhaegar’s laugh? Dany hoped so.

“Did you know my father?” For the first time, Jon didn’t mean Ned Stark.

Dany shook her head. “Rhaegar died before I was born.”

“Me too.”

The khaleesi had so much she wanted to say and so few ways to say it, absent Missandei's tact, or Sansa's eloquence, or the undervalued convenience of speaking Dothraki. Rousing war-cries for fire and blood would win her nothing here in Westeros. Jon Snow fought not to conquer; he fought such that others might live.

Still, she tried. “If Rhaegar was anything like you, I’m proud to call him brother.”

Something paramount shifted in Jon, a weight off his shoulders, a glimmer of sunshine to pierce the Long Night. Gone was the stunted wolf, the northern bastard, the black brother, and in their place a hatchling dragon. “If he was anything like you,” answered the Targaryen prince, “I’m proud to be his son.”

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

When the Wall fell, Dany should’ve let him die.

It would’ve been so easy, so effortless, bittersweet and valiant. Assassination by White Walker. Nobody would’ve blamed her. How could they, if he died in battle, in defense of the realm, in the bitter blizzard and unending night, fighting to restore the dawn? Minstrels would sing songs of his sacrifice for centuries to come. Mothers would name their sons in his honor. A mournful khaleesi would legitimize him posthumously — Jon Stark, at long last — and solidify northern support in the war to come.

She should’ve let him die. Killing Jon was politically savvy; Cersei would approve. Maybe that’s why she didn’t do it. Dany wasn’t vengeful. She wasn’t mad. She wasn’t cruel. Apart from her barren womb and three half-tame dragons, Jon Snow was all House Targaryen had left, the last fragment of her family, a chance to look into Rhaegar’s child and see the brother she never met.

_Jon grew up motherless, but he has an aunt now._

She should’ve let him die. Instead, she flew Drogon into the fray, wights wailing and ice-arrows glancing against black scales. She plucked Jon from the battlefield, risking her life for his.

Ser Jorah was right. She had a gentle heart.

Eyes slammed shut, trembling against her back, the King in the North clung to Dany as Drogon skimmed the clouds. This man, who charged the Bolton cavalry and slew the undead, afraid of flying? He was half-dragon, and dragons belonged in the sky. She would teach him. _Baby dragons need teaching._

Dany jabbed him with an elbow. “Look.”

Together, high aloft upon the Black Dread reborn, the last two Targaryens watched the Wall crumble.

“My family,” croaked Jon, callused fingers gripping her hard enough to bruise. “Winterfell.”

Dany ignored the heat from his hands. How could he feel so warm, even while she sat astride a living, breathing dragon? “I’ll protect them.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Your family is mine now too.”

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

When she returned Jon to Winterfell, safe and sound, his siblings hugged him for five solid minutes.

Rumor had it that Arya Stark couldn’t cry, but cry she did upon seeing her brother alive. The others followed suit, two enormous direwolves bounding about the Great Hall like pups, Sansa pushing Bran in the wheeled chair of Tyrion’s design; the Starklings collided in embraces of relief and affection. They kissed faces. They stroked hair. The North remembers, and the pack survives.

Their joy was short-lived.

“The Wall fell,” whispered Jon, though he might’ve screamed it for the haunting echo and hush that followed.

“We know,” answered Arya, face still buried in his cloak. “Bran saw it through the weirwood."

The greenseer drooped, as though he were somehow at fault. Maybe he was. "I hoped I was wrong.”

Jon ruffled his brother’s hair. “You’re never wrong.”

“How long do we have?” Sansa was frightened, but practical.

“Two days before the Walkers reach Winterfell.” Jon looked to Dany, hopeful but hesitant. Those big brown eyes hurt like a knife to the gut. “Maybe longer, if we rebuild the Wall with fire instead of ice.”

_We, we, we._ The dragon must have three heads. Dany bowed to no king, but her nephew earned himself a nod of diffidence and respect. “Maybe longer,” argued the khaleesi, “with three dragonriders instead of two.”

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

As they evacuated Winterfell, Sansa accused her of caring. “You saved him. Why?”

“I’m his aunt.” Dany was curt and impatient while strapping into Dothraki boots and braces, modified for dragonriding. Again, Tyrion’s design, for there was nothing her Hand loved better than flying Viserion. “Jon’s my nephew.”

Sansa wasn’t buying it. “He stands between you and the Iron Throne.”

Dany huffed. “Him, and an undead army.” She tied her hair into a bun and shot the Lady of Winterfell a pointed glare. Sansa lived so long amongst monsters and charlatans, she started thinking like one. _I'm not a monster._ “You Westerosi love murdering relatives, and guests, and liege-lords, and innocent children, then dare call me savage.”

Sansa caught her arm again, and Dany braced herself for a she-wolf baring teeth. “Thank you.” Whatever the khaleesi expected in retaliation, that wasn’t it. “Thank you for saving him. Jon’s precious to me.”

“To us.” Dany found common ground with the Starks at long last. "If a son so noble survived Robb, is there any mountain you wouldn't move for him, any ocean you wouldn't cross to bring home the living memory of your brother?"

Apparently not, because Sansa never again doubted her intentions.

Looking back, after the war was won and winter ended, that conversation was the most important peace treaty Daenerys Targaryen never signed, with the lifelong mispronunciation of 'dracarys' in Jon’s northern timbre as her just reward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who've read my work in the _Lucifer_ fandom, apparently my muse is experimenting here with a more disorganized, freeform style. That, or maybe she's gotten lazy. :) Thoughts, suggestions, prompts, recommendations?


	2. M'lady Faceless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A silly but heartfelt tribute to our beloved blacksmith, who returned to us this season after many years of rowing. Welcome back, you big beautiful Baratheon bastard. :) Without doubt, this is the sauciest thing I've ever written, but it is indeed fade-to-black. Keepin' it classy.
> 
> Please note the following content warnings:  
> \- **Mature content warning:** non-graphic but frank conversation about sex, discussed between an eighteen-year-old woman and her (currently) platonic guy friend in his mid-twenties.  
>  \- **Potential trigger warning:** mildly graphic references to Melisandre's seduction/assault of Gendry and his long-term psychological consequences. Don't worry. Arya helps.
> 
> Quick reminder that these minisodes are non-chronological, vaguely interconnected, and occur on a somewhat ambiguous and divergent timeline to TV show canon.

**Minisode II:**  
**M’lady Faceless**

Just after midnight, Arya marched into the Winterfell forge, fuming with rage, and demanded point-blank: “Tell me what the Lord’s Kiss is.”

Gendry choked on his own tongue and dropped a hammer on his foot. “Where in seven hells did you hear about that?”

Only then did he notice the unfortunate corner he’d backed into. _Fuck, I should’ve played dumb._ The King in the North told that particular story about his wildling bride in confidence, friend to friend, and Gendry hadn’t breathed a word.

Now he scrambled and suffered for someone else’s slip, because Jon Snow would soundly murder the man who told his little sister about the Lord’s Kiss. “I mean, er— it’s nothing important.” Thank the gods they were alone, his smithy otherwise deserted when Gendry worked this late. He hung his hammer for the night and doffed his smock, feigning disinterest. “Why d’you ask?”

“Because it’s code for something, and no one will tell me what!” Arya crossed her arms and stomped her foot, all of eighteen but petulant as ever. “Tyrion was teasing Pod about a brothel in King’s Landing, and when Daenerys said, ‘I've heard that called the Lord’s Kiss,’ everybody laughed. Even my brother!” She spoke a mile a minute, frustration fueling her. “They didn’t know I was listening, and Jon changed the subject when I asked.”

Gendry scrubbed a palm down his face. “That’s because— gods, it’s vulgar, Arya.”

She rolled her eyes. “I know it’s vulgar, stupid. Why else wouldn’t Jon tell me?” 

Because highborn ladies shouldn’t snoop about such things, but Arya Stark was nothing if not persistent. Gendry knew his friend far too well, and surely as the sun rises in the east a Faceless Man would get answers, either from him or somebody else. Probably best she didn’t resort to drastic measures, like torturing it out of Podrick. 

That poor man was half in love with her already, and if rumors about his prowess were true, then Pod could do a lot more than _tell_ Arya about the Lord’s Kiss. A jealous knot twisted in Gendry’s gut at the prospect.

Rock met hard place. He sighed, resigned to beheading by Longclaw on the morrow. “This conversation never happened, understand?” Arya nodded fervently, clinging to every word. “The Lord’s Kiss is fancy talk for, uh— ” Considering that their friendship truly began when Gendry told her to ‘pull your cock out and take a piss,’ this really brought it full circle. He grit his teeth and mumbled, “Cunnilingus.”

Arya’s reaction was underwhelming, to say the least. “What’s that?”

Gendry blanched. No, no fucking way, he was not this unlucky.

“Gendry,” she prompted again, slightly miffed. “I don't know what that word means. It sounds like Dothraki.”

Seven hells, this went so far above a blacksmith’s pay grade. But should Gendry really be so surprised? Despite Arya being the deadliest assassin this side of the Narrow Sea, a septa raised her in childhood, and septas definitely don’t teach noble ladies this sort of thing.

Gendry tried again. “It’s when somebody kisses a woman, but down— ” He gestured vaguely below her belt. “Down there.”

Arya wrinkled her nose. “People do that?” Her confusion was ridiculously endearing, and that pink on her cheeks had nothing to do with the cold.

A ferocious wave of protectiveness crashed over Gendry. Though her body count outnumbered his ten to one, a maid was still a maid. Arya tilted her head, curious to a fault, and he could hear the next question before she ever voiced it. That’s how well Gendry knew her.

And maybe it was his imagination, but Arya stared at his mouth when she asked: “Have _you_ ever given the Lord’s Kiss?”

A poignant beat, then the honest truth: “No.”

Gendry hadn’t been with a woman since the Red Witch seduced and bled him. No whorehouses in King’s Landing, no tavern girls, no farmer’s daughters, nothing. Every time they cozied up to him — and there’d been a few times, over the years — his skin crawled with phantom leeches, cock flagging for fear of their bite, and he remembered how dangerously near he’d come to burning alive. Not exactly conducive to bedsport.

Maybe impotence was his punishment for fucking a witch, however briefly. Maybe she damaged him beyond repair. Months ago, when Arya asked why the red priestess had stolen him away, Gendry finally confessed to everything that happened on Dragonstone. Without the other Starklings to talk sense and hold her back, their resident Faceless Man would've sailed all the way to Volantis and brought home Melisandre's head on a platter.

And Gendry hadn't even mentioned those invisible scars carved into his mind. The Princess of Winterfell needn’t ever know her friend was useless as a man, too broken to please a woman, too scared even to try.

Besides, they’d barely scratched the surface of her relentless questions anyway. Arya sat on an anvil, this discussion far from over. “Why’s it called the Lord’s Kiss?”

Gendry glossed over the details. “Somebody once asked if all lords do it to their ladies.”

“Do they?”

Gendry scuffed his boot. “If he doesn’t, his lady deserves better.” 

“Why’s that? Do girls like it?” Arya folded her hands over her lap, a subconscious shield, and squirmed in her seat. “To be kissed there?”

Gendry sputtered a little. _Aye, m’lady, you’d like it some._ Instead, he spat: “I wouldn’t know, would I?”

“Is it difficult to learn?”

He shrugged, genuinely unsure. “Jon and Pod told me it takes some practice.”

Arya grimaced. “Ugh, please leave my brother out of this.” She fiddled with a loose lace on her jerkin, and Gendry could almost hear the gears cranking inside her head. “If girls like being kissed there, then why did everybody tease Podrick about it?” 

Gendry almost lied, but Faceless Men could read people like books, and Lord Tyrion loved to spin this story whenever he drank. Which was often. “Pod once spent the night with three whores in King’s Landing, and they refused his money afterward.”

Arya’s eyebrows hit her hairline.

“Yeah, I know,” grumbled Gendry, deeply bitter. At first, he tried to hate Pod for being everything he wasn’t, but Pod was rather difficult to hate. “I didn’t believe it either, but apparently he’s much better with _his_ sword than _a_ sword.”

Arya snorted, and then Gendry snorted, and soon they devolved into raucous, roaring laughter in the empty smithy.

She was so vibrant, so fierce, so clever, so lovely, so young, a princess with her whole life ahead, and Gendry cared about her so bloody much. In fact, he cared about her enough to squash his own worthless feelings and say: “He’s sweet on you, you know.” Gendry clarified. “Podrick.”

Arya suddenly found her cuticles very interesting. “I noticed.” Of course she noticed. Faceless Men notice everything. 

“He’s a good man.” _Much better than me._ But when Gendry searched her face, those grey eyes were empty, absent even a flicker of fondness. Arya felt nothing for Podrick, and a weight lifted from Gendry’s heart — only to be replaced with guilt. How terrible must he be to find joy in another man's loss? 

At long last, Arya mumbled, “He likes my waterdancing better than he likes me.”

Gendry scowled in puzzlement. “Why d’you say that?”

She shot him a dirty look, then motioned at herself. “Arya Horseface, remember? Handsome men only want handsome girls, and Pod’s almost as handsome as you.” A slip of the tongue, for sure, because she looked almost as surprised as Gendry felt.

His ego hummed with pleasure and vanity, until he blinked once, twice, finally digesting what she’d said. “Arry, d’you— ” Maybe Faceless Men didn’t notice everything. Gendry would rectify that, right here, right now. “Don’t be daft. You know you’re pretty.”

Her blank expression suggested otherwise, and it quickly morphed into rage. “Don’t lie. I can tell if you’re lying.”

A switch flipped on Gendry’s temper, so he marched into her personal space and locked their eyes. “Then tell me if I’m lying.” He’d never felt conviction this strong his entire life. “You’re smart and funny and deadly and stupid beautiful. You saved my skin at least twice, and I've watched you spar. You’re well on your way to becoming the greatest swordsman who’s ever lived.”

“Being pretty’s got nothing to do with waterdancing!”

Gendry shook his head in sheer exasperation. Arya had fought with him about some idiotic things in their time, but this took the cake. They were quite literally arguing over whether or not she was attractive, and only she could twist compliments into fodder. 

What a waste of time. He’d been working for hours, and Gendry was tired and hungry and cold. “I can’t very well prove that you’re beautiful any more than I can prove the snow is white. It just _is—_ ”

“You can to prove it.”

Gendry crossed his arms. “And how d’you propose I do that, m'lady?”

“Handsome men only want handsome girls,” repeated Arya, and in that instant, in that infinitesimal _instant,_ once again he heard exactly what she was about to say long before she said it. “Give me the Lord’s Kiss.”

In his seething and indignation, Gendry snapped: “Fine.”

“Fine.”

And then reality sunk in. Both flushed and breathing hard from yelling, each stared at the other, wondering who might turn craven first. Arya perched on the anvil, chin proud, and Gendry stood his ground, resolute on the outside, screaming on the inside. _She’s bluffing. She must be._ She couldn’t possibly think he might—

“Well,” urged Arya, “what’re you waiting for?”

Not bluffing. Definitely not bluffing. Gendry gaped. “We can’t actually do— here, now?” They were in a fucking forge, _outside,_ during the height of winter. What the hell kind of outfit were these Northmen running? “You’re a princess. I’m a blacksmith.” Not to mention approximately ten thousand other reasons why that could never ever happen. “We shouldn’t even be talking about this.”

Arya shrugged, hopping off the anvil. “See, I was right.” She straightened her overshirt, dusted off her breeches, and was that disappointment in her scathing tone? “Handsome men only want handsome girls.”

Gendry felt affronted. “Handsome men would rather not be fed to your brother’s direwolf and dragon.”

“Ghost and Rhaegal don't eat people.” A sliver of doubt slid into her voice, because circumstances might change if an armorer from Flea Bottom got caught kissing one of the Stark sisters between her legs. “And I dunno about you, but I wasn't planning to tell Jon about this.”

Gendry snuffed that tiny flame of temptation before it roared into an unchecked inferno. “We shouldn’t.” He clenched his jaw, because he still hadn’t said no, not precisely. “It’s not proper. You’re a lady, and I’m not your husband.”

“I’m not asking to fuck you,” reasoned Arya. Of course, because the Lord’s Kiss was somehow less intimate? She barely knew what she was asking for. “But even if we did, I’ll never marry anyway, so my maidenhead doesn’t matter.”

Oh, now that took him from frustrated to furious, the mere suggestion that something precious and pure held value only if a perfumed lord deemed it so. “It matters to me,” snarled Gendry, heart in his throat. “You matter to me.”

The silence that followed was utterly deafening. “D’you want to give me the Lord’s Kiss?” Arya searched his face for deception. “I’ll know if you lie.”

A better question wasn’t about shouldn’t or wouldn’t, but rather if he even could. Gendry thought to those girls he denied in King’s Landing, because their touch felt like leeches slithering across his chest, wrists bound in leather, the fatal and certain dread that this was how he’d die, bleeding and helpless at the mercy of a Red Witch—

And then Arya pulled him from memory, a gentle hand on his arm. She understood Gendry so well, he needn’t say another word. “I’ll make that woman suffer for what she did to you. The night _is_ dark and full of terrors, but I am the darkest terror of all.” He didn’t doubt it. The Princess of Winterfell was his very own direwolf, petite and powerful with snowflakes tangled in her hair. How had Gendry been so careless as to fall in love with the Stranger herself? “Valar morghulis,” the Faceless Man vowed.

“Valar dohaeris.” Arya had taught him her words and how to answer, and suddenly Gendry desired nothing more than to serve his lady, fears and reservations be damned. All men must serve. “I’ll give it to you,” he blurted. “The Lord’s Kiss.” His pulse thundered, and her eyes widened. _Gods alive, what am I doing?_

Arya’s grip tightened on his elbow. "You don't have to."

"I want to. I want to try." Gendry swallowed hard. This was madness. He needed a minute to breathe. “But not now. Not here.” A princess deserved better than the mud and dust of a smithy. A princess deserved better than a Baratheon bastard.

She paused, then nodded. “Later,” agreed Arya, “but soon,” and left without a backward glance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just love them so much and want them to be happy. Prayer circle for tonight.


	3. Stormlord

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Given recent discussion on whether the Stark ladies will clash with Dany in Season 8, I wrote a thing: what happens if/when our trigger-happy Dragon Queen discovers who exactly Gendry is? As such, **Arya is at odds with her** in this minisode and **Daenerys is initially villainous** **,** but she's just very wary of Baratheons and eventually comes around.
> 
> Mostly, I want (need) Arya being ferociously protective of Gendry. I'm weak and a sinner. As usual, timeline and canon are frivolous concepts here, but this occurs nebulously after Team Starkgaryen reunite at Winterfell.
> 
> **Potential trigger warnings:** non-graphic brief mention(s) of Joffrey and Ramsay's abuse of Sansa, the Waif's stabbing of Arya, and Melisandre's assault on Gendry.

**Minisode III:**  
**Stormlord**

Gendry was everything a good Targaryen ought to hate.

The last living Baratheon, spawn of the Usurper, King Robert's bastard son and heir. Given the bitter truth of Jon's parentage, the King in the North didn't know what to believe anymore, so his dragonriding aunt _told_ him what to believe — and Dany would rain fire and blood upon this black of hair abomination.

Across the Great Hall at Winterfell, she threatened and bellowed at the bewildered blacksmith: "Your every breath offends me!" Blazing with righteous indignation and hungry for justice, per fucking usual.

Though visibly shaken, Gendry stood his ground, gripping that warhammer tight enough to blanch knuckles. Tension pulsed through the room like an extra heartbeat, for behind him lurked Arya, an especially protective and homicidal shadow.

The Dragon Queen might’ve executed him then and there, except Sansa took her down a few hundred notches. "While a guest in the North, you will heed its laws." The Lady of Winterfell stood from her seat at the high table, gracefully imposing. "Our king forbade punishment of children for their parents’ sins, and I may not always agree, but Jon’s word is final." She folded her hands and stared pointedly at Daenerys. "As a Stark, my brother forgave you for the Mad King’s tyranny. As a Targaryen, he forgives Gendry for the Usurper’s war crimes."

Jon brimmed with pride in his sister — cousin, cousin, not that it mattered. Through this shitstorm of controversy, Sansa and Arya and Bran still loved him the same. He was both Stark and Targaryen, wolf and dragon, and they would accomplish more together than they ever could apart.

Yet undeterred, Dany flung insults with impunity. "Baratheons can't even go extinct properly."

Jon countered, petulant and stubborn. "They said the same of Targaryens."

She rounded on the King in the North. "You knew whose bastard Gendry was this entire time." Dany loomed over Jon, fury boiling. "You knew before Eastwatch, and you didn't tell me?"

"I worried you might roast him alive, and I was right." Jon would not be intimidated. Dany promised her trueborn nephew that they would reign together, peacefully and equally, sovereign monarchs bound in mutual protection for the betterment of Northmen and southrons and everyone in between.

Surprise, surprise, the Dragon Queen was shit at sharing.

And though he loved his aunt, Jon didn't much love being told what to do. "If you hurt Gendry," warned the King in the North, "my family will have no choice but to retaliate with violence." Read between the lines: Arya will flay your face off. "He's a friend to House Stark— "

Dany erupted. "You're not a Stark, Aegon!"

Jon went red with rage, on his feet and roaring in her face: " _THAT IS NOT MY NAME._ "

Every soul in the Great Hall jerked or squeaked or trembled. Jon even startled himself — waking the dragon indeed. Too many leaders were crammed into Winterfell nowadays. Spats like this were becoming more common with each passing moon, but fiery tempers fizzled eventually.

Dany seemed sad less than angry. She approached him slowly, wringing her hands. "Robert Baratheon was a gluttonous whoremonger who slaughtered the dragonborn for sport, and I shudder at what would've happened to you if Lord Stark didn't love his sister more than anything in this life." She reached for Jon, as though he might vanish. "My only family, blood of my blood. Sometimes I look at you, and I still can't believe you're real."

His wrath faded into empathy. He knew exactly how to incense her, because Jon knew what incensed him. And while the Starklings would always love their cousin like a brother, Dany had no other immediate relatives. _A Targaryen alone in the world is a terrible thing._

Jon hated fighting, and he especially hated fighting with Dany. Politics had stolen so much time from wolves and dragons alike. Now it wasted even more; they'd been arguing since the King in the North first set eyes upon the Mother of Dragons, and an undead army marched southward to butcher them all.

"Please listen, Jon." Emphasis on Jon, an apology for ever calling him anything else. The queen pressed her forehead to his, cradling his face between her palms. ”Gendry’s father murdered yours.” A cruel if crucial reminder. "And given half a chance the Usurper would’ve murdered you too."

Jon hadn't thought of it like that, mostly because Prince Rhaegar still didn't feel like his father.

Dany shot a vicious, scathing glare across the hall, straight at Gendry. "He has traitor’s blood." She pulled Jon closer, not-whispering in his ear. "Why wouldn’t a Baratheon smash our heads in the night and claim the Iron Throne for himself?"

"Because I don’t want the throne!" snarled Gendry, his first words in edgewise. "I don’t want crowns or castles or glory." He took a few bold steps toward the king and queen; she prickled with suspicion. "I want to fight alongside you. I want to live to see spring. I want to grow old and wed a good woman and hold a babe of my blood in my arms."

Arya still hovered behind him, ever ready, ever watchful, once faceless, always faceless, but something strange flickered across her eternally blank expression. Something frightened, something sad, something inevitable and… disappointed, maybe? Gendry didn’t witness it, but Jon did. He’d never seen that look from his sister before. _Devastated, why is she devastated?_

Jon made up his mind. "Gendry saved us beyond the Wall. Nearly died from exposure, delivering my distress call." The King in the North eased away from his queen, gentle, comforting, and extended his hand in goodwill to the last Baratheon. “Let the sons of Robert and Rhaegar build bridges instead of burning them."

They clasped forearms, tight and solid, if a bit impersonal, until Jon damned propriety straight to hell and yanked Gendry into a deeply filial and heartfelt hug. The blacksmith was trembling a little and exhaled a shaky breath of relief. "Thought I was dragon bait for sure."

Jon stepped back, smiling. "Welcome to Winterfell." He squeezed Gendry’s shoulders. "Our home is yours."

If Gendry was everything a good Targaryen ought to hate, well— Jon always was a better wolf than dragon.

Daenerys wasn’t pleased. "You really are a northern fool. At least disarm him."

The Unsullied served her, not Jon, but in the time it took Grey Worm to complete two whole steps toward Gendry, Arya had already crossed the Great Hall, unsheathed her dagger, and pressed it to Missandei’s throat. "Touch that smith," hissed the Faceless Man, "and everyone you love dies."

Nobody moved, nobody breathed, until Gendry knelt, slowly, carefully set down his warhammer, and rose again with his hands in the air, empty and unarmed. "Don’t hurt anyone, Arry. Please." A question less than an order. "I’m not worth it."

Arya stared at him, long and hard, clearly disagreeing, before she sheathed steel and resumed her iconic stance: feet apart, chin proud, hands behind her back, face unreadable. Missandei scrambled to Grey Worm and Dany, all three quaking with terror.

"Love makes you weak," warned Arya to the retinue from Dragonstone.

Daenerys looked from Arya to Gendry and back. "It does indeed."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Arya was inordinately fond of that blacksmith.

The Stark sisters might've spent years apart, two halves torn asunder, but Sansa knew that look. She simply never expected to see it on Arya, always so cold, so calculating, so unimpressed with handsome princes and ballads of love. Still true, of course, because Arya was still Arya despite occasionally swapping faces with dead people. But something about Gendry was different.

They obviously knew each other from before, a friendship anchored in the dark days after Ned Stark lost his head. Sometimes they spoke of the Kingsroad and someone called Hot Pie. Sometimes they spoke of Harrenhal and someone called Jaqen. Sansa knew better than to pry, but curiosity might kill her before winter did. Arya liked Gendry. Arya didn't like anybody. Sansa often wondered if Arya even liked her.

Her sister sparred daily in the courtyard where her brothers used to shoot targets, and Sansa watched from the balcony as their father once did. After they murdered the shit out of Littlefinger, everybody in Winterfell wanted to train with a faceless assassin, so she schooled them in waterdancing. Gendry in particular was abjectly terrible, much handier with warhammers than swords.

Amid the flurry of limbs and steel, they were exquisitely careful not to hurt each other, but Arya didn't go easy on him either. "You're too big, too slow." She darted right, pretending to cut him across the belly with Needle. "Dead." He swiped at her; Arya dodged again, then smacked her blade harmlessly against his back. "Dead again."

Gendry circled her, growling with frustration. That look flickered across Arya again, distant and glassy; her focus shifted from his sword arm to the flattering stretch of those leather breeches, to the roll of broad shoulders and thick tendons in his neck. Her guard fell just long enough for him to whack Needle from her left hand, then grab her about the middle and tackle her bodily to the dirt.

A hush spread across the courtyard, and Sansa struggled to contain a sister's protective instinct, because a Guildsman could take care of herself. If Arya Stark disapproved of a man touching her, his hands would no longer be attached at his wrists. Telling, then, very telling, as Gendry straddled her leg and pinned the deadliest person in Westeros with no force, no effort, nothing but a gentle arm across her chest.

"You should stand sideface, m'lady." Gendry smiled down, fond and cheeky.

Nothing made Arya laugh anymore, but she laughed with him. "So I've heard." Through indulging him, she executed a swift, cutthroat maneuver and torqued her hips, flipping Gendry onto his back with a surprised little _oofph_ before her Valyrian dagger slid under his chin. Game, set, match. "Smaller target, yeah?"

Gendry hardly noticed the faceless killer with a knife to his throat, mesmerized instead at that move. "How’d you do that?!" A blacksmith could admire the physics and forces required for someone so small to overturn him. "Teach me to do that!"

Still astride his waist, sitting him like a horse, Arya sheathed her dagger, crossed her arms, and raised an eyebrow. "Make me."

Sansa choked on her own tongue. Arya was flirting with him. Her little sister. Arya Stark. Flirting. And flirting well.

Oh, this was marvelous.

That evening, the sisters ate supper alone in Sansa’s solar. They talked about grain stores and troop movements until Sansa steered the conversation exactly where she wanted: "I saw Gendry get the better of you in training today." She sipped her wine, feigning ignorance. "What happened?"

Arya shrugged. "Lucky shot." But she refused to meet Sansa’s gaze.

"Lie." Sansa knew this game well by now.

Her sister frowned and tried again. "I took a misstep. It happens."

"Not to you it doesn’t." Sansa gloated, while Arya glowered. "What about your blacksmith is so distracting?"

Arya rolled her eyes, opened her mouth to deny everything, but the words caught. "He doesn’t— " She floundered. "I’m not— " And finally, she sighed, rubbing her temple, shaking her head, groaning in futility. "I don’t fucking know."

Sansa could’ve danced for joy. Contrary to popular belief, her sister was a mortal woman after all.

For her part, Arya was fuming. "Don’t look so damn pleased with yourself."

"Have you— " The tone turned serious. "Have you been with him?"

Sansa expected more yelling, regardless if the answer was yes or no or somewhere between. Instead, her sister flushed pink and pushed her leftovers around with a fork. "Of course not. We're just friends."

"Wish I had a friend like that."

"Gendry doesn’t see me _like that._ " Arya huffed to herself. "I’ve never even kissed a man."

"Better to kiss no men than the wrong men." Sansa shot her sister a look. "Trust me."

They sat in silence a while, before Arya volunteered something profound and personal in exchange: "I like how big he is. How strong. When he pinned me, I— I think I liked it." Those grey eyes darted in confusion, certain such perversion grew from a corruption of her soul. "I killed a Faceless Man sent to kill me, because only Faceless Men are skilled enough to kill Faceless Men." Now wasn’t that the purest truth? "But if Gendry came at me with his warhammer, really came at me, I’m not sure I’d win."

"And you… like that?" Puzzled and worried, Sansa stifled the memories of Joffrey and Ramsay, because a baseborn blacksmith from Flea Bottom was everything they weren’t and never could be. Gendry would never hurt her sister, never ever, and suddenly Sansa understood, even if Arya didn’t. "You like the idea of it — knowing he could overpower you, trusting he won’t." She grinned, more than a little impish. "Not unless you ask him to."

For the first time in their lives, it was Arya’s turn to be scandalized. "Sansa Stark!"

Hang social graces, hang being a lady. Sansa was a big sister first, and big sisters should guide little ones. Especially in this. _If not me, who?_ "Margaery Tyrell once told me that women are complicated, and we all like different things." Sansa fiddled with a thread on her gown. "I’d like someone gentle and patient in my bed." She glanced up, teasing again. "You’d like your blacksmith to throw you down and have his way."

Once more, surprisingly shrill: " _Sansa. Stark._ " But Arya didn’t deny it.

Sansa wasn’t finished yet. "Septa Mordane was a sweet woman, but she was wrong about a lot of things. We aren’t prizes to be won. We can be so much more than wives and mothers, more than our virtue, our manners, our house, our name. We are leaders, Arya, and we are sisters." A knot formed in her throat. "Two sides, one coin. I love you more than anything in this life, and nothing will ever make me love you less." She clasped Arya’s hands tightly in her own. "Let’s make up for the years we lost, the years when sisters become friends."

And with that, a dam broke. "I dream of him. Of Gendry," confessed Arya, voice small, a girl where the killer once was. "I’ve dreamt of him for half my life." She squeezed Sansa’s fingers; she squeezed back. "I dream he’s at his forge, covered in soot, and as I got older, the dreams… changed. But they never stopped." She wasn’t crying, not exactly, but it was a near thing. "I thought he was dead. But he’s not. He’s here, and he’s so— " Her breath hitched. "Why do I feel like this? It’s awful."

"If you want him, tell him."

Arya blinked once, twice. "I can’t just— "

"It’s a miracle you found him again, and we might not survive this winter. Don’t waste time." Sansa walked to her desk and opened an ornate little box. Inside was a sachet of dried leaves, which she offered to Arya. "Moon tea. Maester Wolkan snuck it to me, back when Ramsay— " The words died on her lips. "Drink some every morning, and an extra dose… after."

Arya’s face fell. "Might be a moot point. I’m not sure I need it." She stood, untucked her shirt, and exposed her lower belly — with two jagged white scars gouged across it. "During my rite of passage, when the Guild tried to kill me— " Arya swallowed. "The wounds cut deep, hit something vital. I bled a lot." Sansa felt fear and fury. How terribly close she’d come to losing her little sister.

_Something vital. She might be barren._ "Your moonblood," reasoned Sansa, ever practical. "Does it still come?"

"Fewer and further between than before," admitted Arya, readjusting her jerkin.

Sansa pressed the sachet into her hands. "Then there’s a chance. If you need it, promise you’ll use it."

With the briefest hesitation, her sister accepted the gift with a nod. "I promise."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Dany had trouble saying no to Jon.

It was all his fault, that noble Northern fool, who waltzed onto Dragonstone like some salty vagabond, refusing her queenship and blabbering about the apocalypse. Raving lunatics had no right to curls that perfect, voices that deep, or shoulders that broad. More than once, Dany caught herself staring, because his stubbornly endearing Jon-ness made it damn near impossible to concentrate. She'd seven kingdoms to conquer and no time for men.

How utterly absurd that the Breaker of Chains and Mother of Dragons stood transfixed at big brown eyes and a widow’s peak? Ridiculous. Daenerys Targaryen had walked through fire, laid waste to Slaver’s Bay, and met people far more mystifying than Jon Snow. This poisonous obsession must be phase, a fleeting whimsy. Queen she might be, Dany also had a taste for all things deadly and clever and beautiful, with the King in the North a trifecta.

Jon looked like his country, dark and stern and dour, and his country looked like him. Dany was simply curious. That’s all. Curiosity, yes, that’s what they call this unwelcome warmth in her belly. But as she learned a little too late, Targaryens possess an innate weakness for Starks. This curse ran in her family, sure as madness, because Rhaegar suffered once as his sister did now, and both times it snowballed into a political clusterfuck.

Last time a dragon loved a wolf, they brought down the whole house of cards.

Last time a dragon loved a wolf, they created Jon Snow.

He didn't much like being called Aegon, no matter what Maester Maynard's record said, so Dany only used that name when she was cross. "How about Jon Targaryen," she offered instead, brushing a wayward ringlet from his forehead. "Two worlds, one family, the song of ice and fire." He smiled with acceptance.

Jon flew Rhaegal like poetry. He ruled with reverence, humility, and justice. He called out her bullshit and owned up to his. Dany loved him more than anything in this life, and because she had trouble saying no to Jon, they married against her better judgement.

One evening in Winterfell, tangled naked and spent in their furs, Northern husband cuddled to her side, nuzzling her neck, Dany had particular trouble saying no, and Jon fucking knew it. "We should legitimize Gendry," he rumbled in her ear, persuasive and imploring. "He saved me beyond the Wall. He forged Valyrian armor for our dragons." Jon nibbled her ear. "By his courage, I'm here to make love to you, and our children fly through safer skies."

Dany sighed. "Must we talk about the Baratheons right now?"

"Mmhmm."

She carded fingers through his black hair. "Your youngest sister is quite possessive of him."

"She is indeed."

Dany hummed thoughtfully. A match long in the making, stag to wolf. "Shall we betroth them?"

Jon snorted. "Arya won’t take kindly to being told what to do. Even if she wants to do it."

"A family trait, I fear."

Jon rubbed a palm across her belly. "Aegon the Conqueror and Orys Baratheon were brothers."

"I know you care for Gendry." Dany kissed the top of his head. "But he cannot fill the hole that Robb and Rickon left behind."

Jon clung to her a little tighter. He missed his brothers desperately and still suffered nightmares of arrows and daggers in the night. Dany often heard him whimper in his sleep. “House Baratheon shares the blood of the dragon. We're not really alone, and neither is Gendry.“ Jon pulled her close, kissing her navel for emphasis: "But if we might be the last Targaryens, let someone worthy inherit our throne."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Gendry knew fuck all about politics.

But for better or worse, even a baseborn blacksmith understood the bad blood between Houses Targaryen and Baratheon. Things were much simpler back when Jon Snow was Ned Stark's bastard, rather than a trueborn Aegon VII. Not for the first time, Gendry stood condemned for his kingsblood, and if his fate were left to Queen Daenerys, she’d sing as he burned.

Fortunately, the King in the North was far more wolf than dragon, and everyone in Winterfell knew better than to give Arya Stark any more incentive to kill. Her threat still rang in Gendry’s ears, crisp and cool and deadly: "Touch that smith, and everyone you love dies." Strange, that he felt so secure under the watchful eye of a faceless killer.

But she wasn’t a faceless killer to him. She was Arry. He was Bull. Some things never really change.

Gendry liked Winterfell well enough. Bit too cold for a southron boy, but he liked that Lady Sansa rebuilt Mikken’s forge to his specifications. He liked his toasty-warm room in the castle, after recovering from the initial shock of _living in a castle._ He liked knowing where his next meal would come from, and he liked the steady pay. He liked sparring with Arya every day, talking with her, seeing her face again and hearing her voice after all these years. He liked that a lot more than he should.

And he especially liked being away from King's Landing, no longer sleeping with one eye open for Goldcloaks. But out of the frying pan, into the fire, because Gendry escaped the lion’s den only to wander into a dragon pit. And when the queen discovered whose bastard he was, Gendry thought for sure he'd breathed his last breath.

"Daenerys won’t hurt you, now or ever. I won't let her." Jon swore it like an oath, and the king always kept his word. "You’re safe here."

So when House Targaryen held an impromptu court in the Great Hall and summoned Gendry before the high table, he was only a little nervous. Nobody knew what this meeting was about. Bannermen whispered rumors — maybe tonight was the night that Queen Daenerys sentenced Robert’s bastard to die?

And the Starks weren’t afraid to spill blood in their dining room. Petyr Baelish learned that the hard way.

_I’m safe here. I’m safe here._ Gendry spotted Arya in a nearby corner, sword and dagger on each hip. His heart slowed, and his panic ebbed. She’d protect him. She always protected him. "Let that dragon bitch singe a hair on his head," Arya once whispered to her sister, when she thought Gendry was out of earshot. "I fucking dare her."

Arya would cut down every Unsullied in this room if it came to that. Gendry caught her eye and mouthed, "What’s happening?"

She shook her head. She didn’t know. Her left hand moved to Needle’s hilt.

Jon stood from his chair. The hall went silent as he asked Gendry: "What do you know about the founder of House Baratheon?"

"Not much." Gendry shrugged. "I never learned to read."

Daenerys spoke next. "The first Stormlord was Orys Baratheon, bastard brother to Aegon the Conqueror."

"My ancestor was— " Gendry felt like he’d been punched in the gut. "He was a Targaryen bastard?" This was getting ridiculous. How many more sorry sods with dragonsblood were wandering oblivious around Westeros? Jon, Gendry, maybe Hot Pie was a Targaryen too.

"History repeats. A bastard built House Baratheon, and a bastard will rebuild it." Daenerys folded her hands atop the table. "Orys honored the fallen Stormqueen as his bride, adopted her name and her colors. He served Aegon loyally as Hand of the King — his friend, his confidante, his brother. The first Baratheon was fair and good."

"And the same can be said of the last Baratheon." From within his cloak, Jon produced a scroll, sealed in red wax with the three-headed dragon sigil. Oddly enough, he handed it straight to Arya. "Would you please dictate aloud?"

She tore open the document, understandably concerned it might be a death warrant. Far from it.

_"From this day until your last day,_  
_you are Gendry Baratheon,_  
_son of Robert Baratheon,_  
_Lord of Storm’s End,_  
_Lord Paramount of the Stormlands."_

_"Until birth of a Targaryen claimant,_  
_you are Gendry Baratheon,_  
_First of Your Name,_  
_Prince of Dragonstone,_  
_Heir presumptive to the Iron Throne."_

Arya stared at Gendry like she’d never seen him before. "You’re the prince."

"I’m the what?" He didn’t understand half those words. All he heard was Gendry Baratheon in Arya's voice.

Jon rounded the table. "Storm’s End is yours. The Stormlands are yours. And should Dany and I die childless, the Iron Throne is yours. By birthright." He gripped Gendry’s shoulders. "We can teach you to read. We can teach you to write. We can teach you names and sigils and whose words are whose." Jon took the declaration from Arya and slapped it against Gendry’s chest. "What we cannot teach, you already know better than most — kindness and compassion, strength and resilience, loyalty and love."

"I’m a blacksmith." Gendry dithered, clutching the scroll. "I’m nobody’s lord."

Daenerys stood too. "Of course you’re not a lord. Ours is kingsblood, the blood of the dragon." She smiled at him, actually smiled, soft and genuine. "Let wars and rebellions fade into history. Let hate be a forgotten footnote. We are your family, Prince Gendry, now and always, and in winter we must protect one another."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Every living soul in Westeros rallied to fight the Night King.

They banded together on the eve of battle and made camp along the Ruby Ford to await an undead army, marching down the Trident. Most people made themselves scarce when the sons of Robert and Rhaegar sat at a campfire mere yards from the river where Gendry's father put a warhammer through Jon's father. Even Arya retreated into her tent, Ghost trailing behind.

Jon didn't say a word before Gendry broke the ice. "I never thanked you properly, your grace. For my name, my title, Storm’s End, everything." There, figured Gendry, diffident and nonconfrontational, like Master Mott always taught him to handle rich folk.

But Jon was nothing like the noblemen in King's Landing, because he wiped his mouth on his sleeve and offered Gendry a flagon of cheap wine. "My only command," insisted the King in the North, "is quit calling me your grace, _your grace._ " Like brother, like sister, because Arya shoved Gendry on his ass the first time he called her m'lady.

Gendry raised the wine in toast to, "Jon," then drank deep.

When he passed the flagon back, Jon asked a rather reasonable question, given whose sons they were. "You ever meet your father?"

Gendry shook his head. "Saw him once, riding in a parade. Didn't know he was my father at the time." He trusted Jon. He liked Jon. Of all highborns, Northmen were most tolerable. _Except I’m a highborn now too._ "Arry told me King Robert was a fat drunk." Gendry froze, realizing his social blunder too late. "Sorry, I meant Princess Arya told me the Usurper was a fat drunk." King Jon was both a Targaryen and a big brother. Though their houses officially made peace, best to tread carefully.

Jon barked more than laughed. "Don't let her hear you call her a princess." Humor laced with genuine concern. "You'll wake up without a face."

They might die tomorrow, so Gendry dared to ask: "Could we… talk about Arya?"

"Uh, depends." Jon glanced sidelong. "She's my sister, and I know you're close. I'd rather not know how close."

Gendry scrambled. "Not close like that. Not at all." He flushed red to the tips of his ears. _Bloody hell, the king thinks I'm fucking his sister, and he still didn't execute me._ "I only meant— " What had he meant? He feared tomorrow, and Arya made him feel brave. There was still so much he didn't know about her, and Gendry preferred to die knowing everything there was to know about Arya Stark. "I grew up alone, never met my brothers or sisters before the Lannisters killed them. But your family is my family now, and I want to know them."

Kindness seeped into Jon's smile. "Wanna hear about the time Arya stuffed Sansa's mattress with sheep shit?"

And for one night only, Jon Targaryen became Jon Snow again, a bright-eyed boy innocent to White Walkers and war. Turns out, the Starklings were his absolute favorite topic, and once Jon got started he just couldn't stop. How he jealously admired Robb. How everyone babied Rickon. How high Bran could climb before his fall. How fiercely intelligent was Sansa.

Then they talked about Arya. They talked about archery and Needle and waterdancing, Harrenhal and Jaqen H'ghar, the slaughter of House Frey and the murder of Lord Baelish. They talked about Arya for hours upon hours, about how Jon adored Arya, looked up to Arya, would live and die and live again for Arya. Of course Gendry wouldn't admit it, but he knew the feeling.

Tomorrow came, as it always does, but Gendry was ready. As an unholy blizzard approached, the Ruby Ford froze, and a blue-eyed Viserion loomed over the horizon. But on the banks of the Trident, back to where it all began, the sons of Robert and Rhaegar would finally set things right, stronger together than their fathers ever were apart. Where once Aegon and Orys conquered the living, now Jon and Gendry conquered the dead.

With a harrowing shriek and icy gust, the Night King charged.

Gendry readied his warhammer, his horse, and the cavalry behind him. "Ever imagine it'd end like this?"

Eternally honest, Jon mounted Rhaegal. "The dragon's a surprise."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

For his coronation as Stormlord and heir presumptive to the Iron Throne, the Lady of Winterfell made Prince Gendry a goodwill gift.

The leather jerkin and breeches were black, solid black from high collar to boots, except for scant embroidery down his arms. There, golden thread was sewn into antlers, subtle but proud, honoring the sigil of his house. At the notch near his throat was a metallic stag’s head, and even with Arya’s truly abysmal knowledge of needlework, she could tell the clothes were beautiful.

Frankly, so was the man wearing them.

Quiet and covert through the corridors of Storm's End, she lurked in his doorway as Gendry laced up, strapped a warhammer across his back, and stared at his reflection in the mirror. Fine leathers aside, he was still himself, haphazard black hair grown out again, beard unshaven, but a prince if ever there was one. No wonder the Lannisters wanted him dead. With a single glimpse of Gendry, big and powerful with eyes bluer than the Braavosi canals, Arya marveled that anybody ever believed Joffrey was a Baratheon.

But Gendry— fuck, was Gendry a Baratheon.

"You look different," piped Arya, startling him. "Like a proper little lord."

Nothing about him was little, and Gendry glared the glare that meant he was less angry than irritated. Nevertheless, she approached slowly, as you might a wounded animal, because he stared wide-eyed at his own reflection like an unwelcome stranger. "I look like a stag with all these stupid antlers."

"Nice though." Words came unbidden before Arya could smother them. "A nice stag." He shot her a look that was a little too deep and a little too much. She diffused it by sniffing him. "You even smell nice for a change."

"You don’t," snapped Gendry. "You stink."

She shoved him, playful and harmless for old times’ sake, and let Gendry seize her around the middle, hoisting her up and over his shoulder as if she weighed nothing. _Gods, he's strong._ In half-hearted protest, Arya slapped his back, then he swatted her thigh with an open palm, landing a little too close to her bottom. It stung in the best possible way, and she squeaked a very unbecoming squeak that was not entirely objection.

As happened more often than not, their spar threatened to devolve into something else, so Gendry promptly freed her from the welcome prison of his arms. But Arya didn't mind his manhandling. She didn't mind one bit. Anyone else would find Needle through his eye and out the back of his skull, but because Gendry was Gendry, and Gendry was different, Arya's heart did a funny summersault whenever he touched her.

Sansa’s wisdom still resonated. "You like the idea of it — knowing he could overpower you, trusting he won’t. Not unless you ask him to." And shoving him was how Arya asked, but Gendry was agonizingly slow on the uptake. Something else her sister said, shockingly crass— "We all like different things. You’d like your blacksmith to throw you down and have his way." Strictly speaking, she wasn’t wrong.

Gendry smiled, pure and good and oblivious to the absolute garbage dump that was Arya’s mind. "You’re a Faceless Man," he thought aloud. "How much to hire you?"

"Small fortune." She raised a brow. "Why, need someone dead?" With winter come and gone, they’d precious few enemies left to kill, but Arya could still think of a few.

He shook his head. "No, of course not." Gendry started pacing. He was nervous. Why would he be nervous? "But I heard the price for a Guildsman is always payable, to prince and pauper alike, if only you want it bad enough."

Arya wondered again why he was asking, if not to name a name for the Many-Faced God. Fierce and unshakable loyalty seared through her. If sweet, noble Gendry wanted her to kill for him, she’d do it without thought, without question, because the reason was undoubtedly a good one. _Ask me to kill for you, Gendry._ Her breath caught and her belly fluttered at the idea.

"Do Faceless Men ever— " He swallowed hard. "Can rich folk hire a Faceless Man for their castle guard?"

The question surprised her. "Nobody ever asked."

Gendry plucked at a loose lace on his jerkin. "After I’m crowned— " He made a distasteful face. "You'll go back to Winterfell?" Arya nodded. Once and always a Stark, where else would she go? Finally, finally, Gendry blurted: "Storm's End needs guardsmen, but you’re better than a dozen knights."

"You want— " Her heart stopped beating. "You’re asking me to stay here. With you. For— "

" —forever, if you want. Or not, if you don't!" Hearing how that sounded, Gendry cringed and scrambled to clarify. "Strictly professional. Nothing untoward. You’re an especially lethal sellsword, and I’ll compensate you accordingly." He listed everything she might want. "I’ll forge enough Valyrian steel to arm every northern soldier. My flagship is yours, to sail the world and see Sansa and Jon and Bran whenever you like. I’ll build a new holdfast and name you its lord. Whatever price, consider it paid, but if you do leave the Stormlands— " Gendry paused, his feet suddenly interesting. "If you leave, please promise to come back."

Arya could’ve said something witty. She could’ve teased him relentlessly and never let him live this down. She could’ve simply said no, as any reasonable Guildsman would to a job that was the exact opposite of killing. Instead, she did the stupidest thing she possibly could’ve done.

She kissed him.

Arya fucking kissed him, kissed _Gendry,_ no holds barred, full on the mouth. The hearth crackled and spat, bathing them in heat and firelight, like one of Sansa’s stupid songs. Of all the ridiculous, reckless ideas since Aegon first conquered Westeros, this ranked right up there. Gendry was the crown prince, the most eligible bachelor in the Seven Kingdoms. He might sit the Iron Throne someday, with all the makings of a fine king, and nobody wanted a Faceless Man for their queen.

_Me as a queen, how moronic._ But Arya still kissed him like her life depended on it.

Their noses bumped, and their breath mingled, and Gendry nearly leapt out of his own skin, yanking away in sheer astonishment.

"I’m— " Realization dawned, and Arya felt sick. The Red Woman forced him once, just like this; Arya knew because he’d told her in confidence, friend to friend. Of course, she’d gone and hurt him again. _I really am a monster._ "Oh gods, Gendry, I am so sorry." Except she wasn’t really, not at all, and that made it even worse. With only one kiss, her lips tasted like him. She hated herself for loving it. "I should've asked first— I won’t do it again— "

Gendry touched his mouth. "No, it’s— I’m fine." His mind raced to catch up. "Don’t be sorry."

Neither spoke for a good minute.

Gendry dipped his head and scuffed his boots, glancing up through dark lashes. _Seven hells, were his eyes ever blue._ "When I said any price, I meant it. Dragonsteel, ships, holdfasts, the best blacksmith this side of Qohor— " He smiled that cheeky smile, and a weight lifted from Arya's chest. "I'm a man of my word." Gendry was suddenly, deeply serious. "Arya, you must know— surely, you know— you can kiss me whenever you like."

Quite the offer, and Faceless Men don't renege on deals.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I give you Gendry Baratheon, the awkwardly lovable prince who desperately hopes never to be king. You know the births of Dany and Jon's children are celebrated for days at Storm's End, because each new Targaryen pushes Gendry further and further from that ugly iron chair. :)


	4. Dragonsteel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **This minisode is a standalone,** with zero respect even for my own fic's timeline because I didn't plan well. Full disclosure, I have dozens of Gendrya First Kiss headcanons and can't settle on a favorite, so here's another. :) What you're about to read makes absolutely no sense in context with any other minisode: Gendry's still a bastard, he and Dany coexist just fine, and Arya already has an inkling what the Lord's Kiss is.
> 
> All blacksmith knowhow is via Google, so errors are artistic license, and for purposes of this minisode, dragonsteel and Valyrian steel are the same metal. For book readers, I recognize this is may be inaccurate.
> 
>  **Mature Content Warning:** I cannot confirm or deny if an eighteen-year-old woman and her (formerly) platonic guy friend in his mid-twenties make out on a forge table. **Very consensual, though Gendry's a gentleman and needs some persuasion to get with the program.** Still keepin' it classy, but this is a lot less classy than Minisode II.
> 
>  **Fun Fact:** In room air, the maximum temperature of a coal forge fire is about 1,900 °C (3,500 °F). While the melting point of iron is well within range (about 1,500 °C / 2,800 °F), the melting point of obsidian is higher due to its aluminum oxide component (about 2,100 °C / 3,800 °F). No data on the average temperature of dragonfire!!

**Minisode IV:**  
**Dragonsteel**

As the best things in life often do, it started over drinks.

Of course, Arya herself rarely partook in alcohol and never to excess. Clouded judgement and slow reflexes weren’t her idea of a good time, and she disliked its taste anyway. But the boys were already ten pitchers deep, still going strong, entertaining as hell, and Arya felt perfectly content to spend her night judging them.

Lord Tyrion, Bronn, and the Hound quibbled over who’d cheated who at cards, while Ser Davos regaled the Great Hall at Winterfell with smuggler’s stories. More than a few were indelicate, and all were hysterical. After a particularly crass punchline, he apologized to Arya. "Ah, beg your pardon, princess." She hadn’t the heart to argue her title at a knight who rescued Jon and Gendry from their own stupidity. "Flea Bottom accent, Flea Bottom humor."

"I’m used to both." She jerked her thumb at the nearby blacksmith. "He once told me to pull my cock out and take a piss."

Jon choked on his ale, and Gendry was mortified. "That’s not— " He scrambled to clarify. "That’s out of context, your grace!"

"I should hope so." The King in the North coughed up a lung while laughing his ass off. "Care to elaborate?"

Gendry shook his head in defeat, nursing his mead and grumbling at Arya: "Quit getting me in trouble."

The evening wore on, and she watched everyone get drunker. The Hound's expletive frequency and severity worsened, while Gendry whipped an obsidian arrowhead from his pocket to brag about its aerodynamics at anybody who'd listen — so Jon, Jon, and Jon. And as was obligatory when wine started flowing, Tyrion spun the tale about Podrick Payne and the whores of King’s Landing.

"They refused his money afterward," slurred the Hand of the Queen, marveling as if he hadn’t told his favorite story a thousand times before. But tonight, there was an unexpected epilogue: "Pod, tell our fine friends how you achieved that which no man ever has."

Podrick went beet-red, eyes flickering to Arya. "I’d rather not, m’lord." He was tipsy, but not that tipsy. "We’re in a lady’s company."

The Hound snorted. "That _lady—_ " He spat it like a slur, which Arya appreciated. " —is an elite assassin who baked two men into pies and fed them to their father before poisoning the rest of his family." He slugged back another ale. "She’s seen and done things that’d make you cunts shit yourselves."

Bronn raised his mug in a respectful toast. "To the Guild of the Faceless Men." He drank deep. "May they never learn my name."

"Too late." Arya rested her palm upon Needle, just serious enough to make him squirm.

Tyrion clapped his hands. "Excellent. No subject off-limits. Now that’s settled." He poured the wine. "Shall we resume torture of Podrick?"

That poor squire nearly melted into the floor. Bronn slapped his shoulder. "C’mon, lad. Even if you don’t tell these good men what your magic cock can do— " The knight nodded at Arya. " —at least offer the pretty princess a demonstration."

Gendry went rigid, angrier than she'd ever seen. Maybe it was the mead? "Oi, that's the king’s sister!"

"Aye," said Jon, eerily calm, but brimming with protective fire.

But Arya could hold her own. "If Pod really impressed those women half as well as you think, then a tongue, not a cock, was his weapon of choice."

What followed was silence, complete and total, during which Podrick buried his incriminating face in hands, Gendry flapped his jaw like a landlocked fish, and her brother suffered what might’ve been a minor stroke. Then, and only then, the Hound started _howling_ with laughter, slapping his knee, bent over his lap, eyes watering, gasping for breath. Tyrion followed suit, and even Ser Davos, until the entire hall was doubled over, beside themselves.

Bronn had never looked prouder of anyone in his life. "I like you, little Stark."

But he still seemed perplexed, so Arya elaborated. "As an acolyte for the Guild, I spied on Braavosi courtesans in the marketplace — the Black Pearl, the Merling Queen, the Daughter of the Dusk." Rapt attention turned upon her, and Arya rolled her eyes. Men who liked women were tediously predictable. "The courtesans live on big, beautiful barges and sail the Canal of Heroes. Bravos worship them like Westerosi worship gods."

That piqued curiosity. "And?" prompted Lord Tyrion. "What else did you learn?"

Arya smiled. "Costs a fortune to hire a courtesan, and that’s only as an escort. No funny business, else her guards will geld you."

She looked straight at Podrick, and he shrunk with shame. But he’d nothing to be ashamed of. Arya reached across the table to grasp his hand, lost to the memory of a city across the sea. In Braavos, women could be proud courtesans and savvy bankers and faceless killers. The Seven Kingdoms were so different, so stifled and backwards. Her home prided itself as abhorrent of slavery, and yet subjugated those unlucky enough to be born female.

And the men who fought for change met with embarrassment and ridicule.

Arya squeezed his fingers. Pod was trembling. "You can please women. Wear that with pride. We’re very complicated." The boys all huffed the same little laugh. Distinct agreement. "Invitation to a courtesan’s barge is a tremendous privilege. Power and gold cannot buy that. You must earn it, prove yourself worthy in heart and deed. But even then, the courtesan chooses whether or not to spend her night with you." She pondered, thoughtful. "Whores in King’s Landing have no choice, no guards, no barges, so they must honor their favorite in a different way." Arya inclined her chin, a waterdancer’s bow. "You deserve nothing but my utmost respect. Ser."

Podrick met her gaze slowly. He had kind eyes, brown eyes. _Not blue. Not Gendry._ Arya abruptly released his hand, cursing her knee-jerk reaction, and offered one last confession, sure to stir controversy. Jon and Gendry wouldn’t like this. Not one bit.

"When I first arrived in Braavos," she said, “I was given the choice to train as a Faceless Man or a courtesan.”

Wrath flashed across Jon’s face, and Gendry gripped his mug so hard the handle cracked off. _Westeros, not Braavos._ Even the most wonderful men on this continent — her beloved brother and her best friend, brave and gentle and strong — couldn’t possibly fathom that the life of a courtesan was far more virtuous than that of a Guildsman.

"I chose the Many-Faced God." She drew her Valyrian dagger, quick as a blink. Every soul in the room flinched. "Perhaps I chose poorly."

From the neighboring chair, Gendry appeared in almost physical pain, compulsively rolling that obsidian arrowhead between his palms. Bathed in flickering firelight, he stared at Arya, then her knife, then the arrowhead, over and over, until something in his mead-muzzy mind finally clicked.

"Arry." She worried about an oncoming lecture, about highborns and lowborns, about social constructs and titles and ‘you wouldn’t be my family, you’d be m’lady.’ Instead, he held out his hand. "Gimme the dagger."

Oddly about-face. She tilted her head. "What for?"

He glared sidelong. "Must you always be difficult?"

Only for him, so Arya twisted her wrist, flipped the knife, and offered its hilt. Gendry set her blade and his arrowhead on the tabletop, studying them side by side with the clinical precision of a drunk. He flicked the dragonglass, then flicked the dragonsteel, and repeated this ritual a few more times before announcing, quite anticlimactic: "There’s obsidian in your dagger."

Everyone else was too sloshed to recognize this potentially phenomenal breakthrough in the history of metallurgy, and Arya knew far less about making weapons than weilding them. But unless she was sorely mistaken, the shitfaced blacksmith in her dining room just rediscovered a long-lost ingredient necessary to forge fresh Valyrian steel. _Which kills White Walkers like nobody’s business._

He pointed at the Valyrian blade. "It’s an alloy of volcanic glass and traditional steel. See those black veins?" Gendry traced streaks through the metal, streaks that precisely matched the obsidian arrowhead in color and texture. He was right. Those ripples were a distinctive hallmark of all dragonsteel. What else could they possibly be? "Somehow, the Valyrians melted dragonglass, mixed it with iron, and then molded, hammered, and tempered it without shattering the damn thing." He was puzzled, but determined.

The King in the North was listening. "S’that even possible? Dragonglass is stone." Jon seemed somewhat dubious.

Ser Davos was listening too. "What kind of fire melts stone?"

A lifetime ago, once prisoner in a ruined castle, Gendry had asked that question as well, a boy with more curiosity than sense. Perhaps everything does happen for a reason, every chance encounter, every night at the Lannister’s mercy, spent sleeping in the muck and fearing for their lives.

How could the Valyrians smelt obsidian with iron? How would a forge fire burn hot enough to liquify volcanic glass? Arya and Gendry came to the exact same conclusion at the exact same instant, launching from their chairs in perfect synchrony.

"Harrenhal," whispered Arya, one word to solve the ancient mystery. They’d seen its melted stone. They’d seen proof.

And when Gendry answered, "Dragonfire," together they bolted for the smithy.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Only Rhaegal was small and nimble enough to land in the courtyard without breaking Winterfell. 

That dragon worshipped the ground Jon walked, but a true love story had unfolded between Rhaegal and Ghost. From the moment they met, his dragon and direwolf got along like a house on fire. Unnatural as it seemed, they were friends. Perhaps Rhaegal still mourned the loss of Viserion, his lifelong companion and brother. Perhaps he bonded with Ghost as a surrogate. Or perhaps you don’t get to choose who you love, and some things are just meant to be.

One look at the Mother of Dragons, and Jon could empathize. 

Usually so still and stoic, Ghost wove around Rhaegal's feet, play-bowing and spinning, while the dragon rumbled with a sound that Jon now understood as a purr. And because this great green beast dwarfed everyone and everything, Rhaegal took obsessive care not to squish Ghost, each step slow and cautious, tail unmoving, wings tucked close. They bumped noses in greeting, impossibly gentle for animals that could devour a man whole.

No matter how many times she saw them together, Dany watched with fascination. "A dragon knows who his true friends are."

"The lone wolf dies, but the pack survives." Jon kissed her temple, then glanced over his shoulder to their family and bannermen, northerners and southrons, nobles and bastards, Unsullied and wildlings and Dothraki. They'd survive this winter together or not at all. "But my father forgot to mention our pack might grow beyond wolves."

Gendry approached, wary of Rhaegal's teeth, then bowed to the Dragon Queen and handed her an unlit torch. "Sam Tarly still searches his archive for anything about Valyrian metalwork, but a Qohorik armorer once told me they used blood-magic." The blacksmith chuckled to himself. "As if obsidian and dragonfire didn't complicate things enough."

Dany smiled softly. "I defer to your expertise, Master Baratheon." A nickname more than anything, unofficial and technically inaccurate, but Gendry looked like he'd been punched. "If this attempt succeeds, if you forge fresh Valyrian steel, then you just won this war for the living."

"Might be a fool's errand," he admitted. "But I want to try. I need to try. And it takes something hotter than coal fire to smelt obsidian with iron."

Dany passed the torch to Jon. "Rhaegal is your mount." She urged him forward. "Ask our son for dragonfire."

Jon balked. His High Valyrian was abysmal, and he'd never said the word aloud before. _What if I mispronounce it and burn Winterfell to the ground?_ But Rhaegal blinked those big golden eyes, almost expectant, so the King in the North held out his torch, clear of flammable clothes, exhaled a deep breath, and finally worked up enough gall to say: "Dracarys."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

As usual, in a tattered old tome stowed under his bed, Sam Tarly found the one seemingly irreverent factoid necessary to save the world.

He dictated aloud. "You must temper fresh-forged dragonsteel in boiling water admixed with the Blood of Warring Kings." Their not-maester — better at his job than most actual maesters — was inordinately excited, but everybody in the Great Hall just blinked at him. "Well, the noun is gender-neutral in High Valyrian, so more literally the Blood of Warring Monarchs."

He showed the book to Missandei, who approved this rudimentary translation with her sweetest smile. "Perhaps this is why the Valyrian Freehold conquered so many peoples," suggested the queen's wisest councillor. "Blood from captive kings served in the manufacture of dragonsteel."

Gendry argued semantics amongst his fellow armorers. "And blood-magic somehow prevents the alloy from shattering?"

Sam's face fell, deeply disappointed. "You don't think it'll work?"

That's not why Gendry was worried. "Fucking kingsblood." He shifted uncomfortably, smothering memories of a Red Witch and her leeches.

Sam made a wishy-washy sound. "It's blood-magic, for sure, but no spells, no rituals, no eclipses or comets or human sacrifice or anything." He shrugged. "We just need a couple drops of blood from two royal families that don't like each other very much." As if that were readily available, common as the virgin snow outside?

The King in the North looked to Queen Daenerys, only half-kidding. "Do you and I count?"

Somebody in the hall snorted, maybe Tyrion, maybe Davos, probably both.

Daenerys steepled her fingers. "You're righteously infuriating, my love, but we've never been at war." She reclined in her chair, somewhat defeated. "I doubt Cersei will be willing to bleed for our cause." She tapped her foot, thinking hard. "If the Usurper were alive, together a Targaryen and Baratheon co— " She stopped mid-sentence, mid-word, locking eyes with a certain befuddled blacksmith.

Soon, everyone in the Great Hall stared at Gendry too. He looked left, looked right, and sighed again: "Fucking kingsblood."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

It worked.

By some godsgiven miracle, it actually worked.

After a near-painless prick, compliments of Arya's dagger, Gendry and Daenerys both bled into the same boiling cauldron. In went the molten alloy of volcanic glass and iron, smelted in a crucible over dragonflame. Steam hissed like an angry serpent, filling the smithy with humid heat, and out came the very first lump of newborn Valyrian steel in over four hundred years.

They'd done it. What Master Mott could only dream of, his apprentice did it. _Serves him right for selling me to the Watch._

At first, Gendry sat the dragonsteel on his anvil, gawking like a moron, before he reheated and shaped it into a plain but pretty circlet. Fire and blood birthed it. Only proper the Dragon Queen should wear it. Her silver crown didn't shatter as it cooled, and those distinctive obsidian ripples were almost iridescent.

Dragon _glass_ might kill White Walkers and wights, but was far too brittle for swords or armor. Dragon _steel_ though...

The Great Hall went silent as he knelt before Daenerys, offering his humble gift. "Valyrian steel, newly forged. The Walkers wreck regular blades, but they can't crack this." Gendry set her crown on the table and promised more to come. "With enough time, enough manpower, enough obsidian, we can forge enough dragonsteel to arm your Unsullied, your khalasar, the Vale knights, the wildlings. I'll make breastplates and helms for your dragons too." He smiled, genuine and heartfelt. "I'm sorry the Night King killed one of your children. I won't let him kill another."

The queen held her Valyrian circlet like a treasure, her last hope for the future. In a way, it was. "Then I'm at your service," swore Daenerys, "now and always." Gendry glimpsed the bandage on her arm. It matched his own. Poetic, somehow, that Baratheon and Targaryen bloodshed might start one war and end another.

He swallowed hard. "But I'm only one smith, your grace. I can't outfit an entire army alone."

Queen Daenerys raised her hand, palm out. "Say no more." She set aside her crown and stood, ready to work, ready to mine Dragonstone bare of volcanic glass, ready to bleed herself dry if it came to that. "Tell me how I can help."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

All Winterfell rallied to mass-produce dragonsteel, but every second Arya spent in that smithy was excruciating torture.

She didn’t mind the hard labor. Not at all. If anything, Arya celebrated the magic of metallurgy, how weapons were born from useless blocks of iron and stone. And she was more than eager to assist the armorers, who were overworked, underpaid, and chronically exhausted. Gendry in particular scarcely ate, barely slept, rarely if ever left the forge, all in defense of home and family against the Night King.

They needed more dragonglass. They needed more Valyrian steel. A shit-ton more. And fast.

That being said, every second Arya spent in that smithy was excruciating torture, but blacksmithing wasn’t her problem.

The fucking blacksmith was her problem.

Gendry couldn’t possibly understand the portrait he painted, backlit by forge fires, hammer in hand, muscle bulging through his arms and back and shoulders with every swing. Since the smithy burned hotter than the seventh pit, what with dragonflame in its ovens, he often forewent a jerkin and smock. Not that Arya paid any heed to how sweat gathered along his collarbone, in the ripples of his abdomen, along the valley of his spine. Obviously not. She was a faceless assassin, not some blushing coquette.

Though someone once said that the young Robert Baratheon looked like a maiden’s fantasy. Arya only ever knew the king as a fat drunk, so she hadn’t believed. But damn Gendry and his blue eyes and his stupid smile and his stupid everything, because she sure as hell believed now.

In fulminant denial, Arya avoided him as best she could. Hardly a challenge. Like every other able-bodied person in Winterfell, she woke before sunrise to train in the courtyard — sparring, archery, everything in between — and didn’t call quits until dusk. Only armorers were exempt from such drills, priority given to their metalwork, so she almost never saw Gendry during the day.

Every evening, though, when she helped to haul obsidian, iron, and coal into the smithy…

Tonight he wore a fitted vest with leather vambraces laced up his forearms, and was entirely engrossed in the red hot dragonsteel on his anvil. Ridiculous, how even the percussive ring of his hammer sent her tummy aflutter. Arya set a supply crate near his workbench and turned tail to run. _Don’t look at him._ She was stronger than this. She survived the House of Black and White. She survived King's Landing, Harrenhal, the Red Wedding. She could survive one beautiful blacksmith. _Do. not. look._

But impressively dark bags hung under his eyes. She had to ask. "Gendry." Arya felt a pang of concern and affection. "How long’s it been since you slept?"

"Oh, not that long." Gendry yawned, scrubbing a palm down his face, smearing soot. "It’s only been, uh— " Then he thought about it, really thought about it. "Sorry, I— what was the question?"

Arya rolled her eyes. "Never mind. You answered it."

He pushed himself too hard, demanded the impossible. Gendry needed help, at least a dozen extra armorers and more hours than a day can hold, so Arya resigned herself to another harrowing night of not-staring at his ass. They’d tackle this backlog of work together, and she wouldn’t leave the smithy until he did, because what’re friends for? 

"Point me in a direction. Give me a job." She spread her hands in offering. "I’ll do anything to get you out of this forge and into bed."

Sleep-deprived, the double entendre struck Gendry speechless, and Arya only realized what she’d said after she said it.

Her recovery was far from graceful. She was tired too. "I meant— " Arya crossed her arms, a little flushed, mostly miffed. "You know what I meant."

Gendry shuffled awkwardly and glanced at the crate she’d brought in. "Raw dragonglass?" She nodded. "I need it powdered, so it’ll smelt evenly with the iron overnight." He pointed to a complex contraption with a conveyer belt, stone rollers, and wooden crank. "That’s the grinder Lord Tyrion designed. Glass goes on the belt, then turn the crank. Bit tedious, but nothing tricky." He paused, suddenly uncertain about a highborn girl getting her hands dirty. "Only if you want to, m’lady."

Arya shed her cloak, rolled up her sleeves, and set to task.

Her sleep was especially fitful that night, plagued with familiar forge-dreams that left a teasing ache in her belly.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

For the dragons' Valyrian armor, Gendry embossed a Targaryen sigil on their helms and a Stark sigil on their breastplates.

Jon loved it, but Daenerys loved it more. "Our children fly with a direwolf guarding their hearts." Out in the open for all Winterfell to see, the queen kissed her king, fierce and shameless, fingers buried in his black curls. Jon kissed her right back, so fiery and intimate that bannermen diverted their eyes while the Dothraki whooped encouragement.

They parted only when Sansa cleared her throat for the second time, waving an inventory in their faces. "That's all very romantic," deadpanned the Lady of Winterfell, "but our iron stores are rapidly depleting, and ice delays any incoming cargo from White Harbor." She shot her brother a hard look. "No more iron, no more dragonsteel."

Arya bristled to Gendry's defense. "Our smiths work to the bone already. In a fortnight, they forged enough Valyrian steel to arm and armor half the host." She stood with her hands behind her back, feet apart, chin up, a waterdancer at the ready. "But that's still not enough. The Night King advances down our eastern shore, and we can't send soldiers into battle without effective weapons. It'll be a massacre, and our dead become their wights."

Somewhat reluctant, the King in the North eased away from Daenerys, back to business. "Until the White Knife thaws and another shipment arrives, we need an alternative source of iron." He looked to Gendry, open and trusting. "Suggestions?"

Nothing great, but he'd half an idea. "There's more than enough traditional steel between the khalasar and Unsullied and Vale knights, but it's useless against the Army of the Dead. Their ice-weapons shatter it like glass." Gendry condemned himself to even less sleep than he was already getting. "Melt it down, every blade, every arrow, every scrap of armor, and reforge it into dragonsteel. All of it."

Jon bowed his head in gratitude. "Consider it done, Master Baratheon."

Over the next three days, swords and arakhs and helms and breastplates poured into the smithy, and out came renewed hope. Everyone in Winterfell doubled their efforts, lugging supply crates, shoveling coal, fletching arrows, tending the dragonflame furnaces. Jon and Daenerys volunteered for the lattermost — nifty and fireproof, those Targaryens — while Arya tirelessly ground obsidian into fine powder.

She was a tremendous help, truly, steadfast and with enviable stamina, because the poor girl must've been exhausted. Arya trained all day, sore and bruised from sparring, only to labor in his forge long after dark. Of course, once Arya Stark set her mind to something, death itself couldn't stop her. Gendry never heard a single peep of complaint, and her company felt like a welcome reward after endless hours at an anvil.

Though truth be told, Arya was also the tiniest titch... _distracting._

Dragonflame burned hot as hellfire, and she'd taken to wearing less and less whenever working in the smithy. Completely reasonable. Nothing indecent. But seeing her sans a heavy jerkin and northern tunic was jarring, because her cotton undershirt and deerskin breeches left so little to his imagination. Gendry had almost forgotten how much power Arya contained within her petiteness. Dare he call her dainty? She'd punch him for sure.

But she grew up in their years apart. Gone was that scrawny girl who called him a stupid bull, and in her place stood this clever and capable woman, with those pert little breasts and a round ass that Gendry definitely didn't admire. Though Arya still occasionally called him a stupid bull. Some things never change.

Tonight, something was off.

She didn't talk much, and when she did it was clipped, curt. Maybe training didn't go well, or her siblings were being irksome? Gendry would typically assume she was mad at him, except they rarely saw each other outside the smithy. He'd so few opportunities to irritate and enrage her. He missed it.

When she pinched her finger on a gearwheel and cursed like a sailor, Gendry crossed his arms and observed, "You’re in an especially foul mood."

Arya finally snapped: "I need you to reforge Needle into dragonsteel."

Gendry stared unblinking. Whatever he expected, that wasn’t it.

She took a deep, calming breath and repeated herself, glacially slow. "I need you. To reforge Needle. Into dragonsteel. I won’t have it shatter against a White Walker." She brandished a finger at Gendry, issuing explicit instructions: "Incorporate the original metal. Keep its weight and balance the same." Arya curled her left hand protectively about the hilt of her beloved rapier. "And when you’re finished, I better not notice an ounce of difference, is that clear?"

Gendry suddenly couldn’t breathe. "You want me to— " Needle was her most precious possession. Needle was Winterfell and the North and her long-lost family, everything she loved, everything that made Arya— well, _Arya._ Smelting it down would be like molding her soul in his hands. "You’d let me reforge Needle?"

Arya wore the look that meant he was being especially thick. "I’m not happy about it, stupid, but it has to be done." She unsheathed the little sword, setting it reverently upon his workbench, bestowing the greatest honor he’d ever received. "And you’re the only smith who’s ever gonna touch Needle."

By the time his brain caught up with his heart, Gendry was kissing her.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Not much could surprise Arya anymore — Faceless Man, and all that — but being mauled by Gendry definitely topped the list.

His kiss wasn’t sweet, and it wasn’t gentle, nothing like Sansa’s stupid songs. He damn near devoured Arya, to be honest, seizing her face in rough hands, mouth hot and eager, barreling them backwards until her ass slammed into his workbench. Needle clattered to the floor, well out of reach, but she still had her dagger, ready and waiting to plunge through his heart if she took offense. 

She didn’t. Of course she didn’t.

This was… rather nice, actually. Better than nice. She’d never kissed a man. He tasted like woodsmoke.

Why’d they not done this before? She’d forgotten the reason.

Heat diffused through her, heart to core. And instead of stabbing him, Arya squeaked a sweet little sound that Gendry mistook for protest, because he tore away like he’d been burned. "Oh, gods." Halfway between bafflement and horror, his sanity flooded back, and she mourned the loss of his touch. "Seven hells, I didn’t mean to— I’d _never—_ "

That was the same burgeoning panic he wore when Arya of House Stark first told him her name, and Gendry realized he'd been pissing in front of a lady.

She peeped, voice small, "Why’d you st— ?"

Gendry took a giant step backward and promptly fell to his knees, head hung in shame. "Forgive me, m’lady. Please. I’d no right."

Oh, now Arya was aroused, unsatisfied, confused, _and_ furious. Half a minute ago, she was being manhandled onto a table with his tongue down her throat, and now they were back to m’lady? No way. Not today. He’d given her a taste. She wanted more.

And was he seriously kneeling? Arya rolled her eyes. "Dammit, Gendry, stand up."

He did stand, very slowly, head still bowed and gaze deflected, tense as a bowstring and bracing himself for some awful consequence.

Now she had his attention, Arya asked again, deathly calm: "Why’d you stop?"

Gendry blinked dumbly. "Because I’d no right to kiss you."

Him, of all people? What a ridiculous notion. "You’ve every right to kiss me."

A beat. He stiffened. "No, I don’t."

Arya was flummoxed. "I decide who can and can’t kiss me, and I say you can!"

"Bastard boys can’t kiss highborn girls!"

Arya fucking lost it. "We're witnessing the end of days, you bullheaded moron!” Hang nobility, hang legitimacy, hang propriety. After everything they’d been through, everything he’d seen, how could Gendry still waste breath on the social hierarchy of a dying culture? "An ice dragon tore down the Wall. The dead are coming to kill us. We might not survive this winter." She slammed her fist on his workbench. "You could ruin me right here, right now, and nobody would care!"

"Your family would care," argued Gendry, bitter and fuming. "The king would care."

Arya crossed her arms. She loved her brother, she did, but— "Jon forfeit any right to judge my life choices when he fucked his aunt." She seized Gendry by the laces on his vest, dragging him close enough to breathe each other's breath. "And you stole a kiss from the Many-Faced God." Her devious little smile promised terrible and wonderful things. "A girl must give it back."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

 _She_ kissed _him_ this time, but with twice the ferocity.

And because Gendry was weak, and a sinner, he whimpered a sound softer and smaller than a man should ever make, tearing her hair loose from its half-plait, tangling fingers in it. Gods alive, he fucking loved this, loved her, pawing at his northern princess like a baseborn savage. But Arya gave as good as she got, fumbling but greedy, her hands all over his arms and shoulders and neck, nails sharp, touch-starved.

They crashed into his workbench again. Gendry hoisted her up, sat her atop it, and when she parted her knees, he stepped between them. Unthinking, lost in her lips and her hair, Gendry forgot himself, pressing a palm into the small of her back, slotting their hips flush. And that's definitely when Arya first felt a man hard between her thighs, because she jerked in surprise.

A few layers of leather were nowhere near enough to mistake it for anything else. Gendry yanked away, red to the tips of his ears. "Sorry, sorry."

He stepped back, until she locked her legs about his waist, tight as a strangler vine, and rolled against him like she was born to drive Gendry mad. Arya Stark was a fierce little thing, tiny but vicious, determined and lethally strong. Gendry couldn't unseat her if he tried, and fire seared through him as she wriggled and writhed. His groans grew inhuman, and it took every fiber of resolve not to rut through their clothes and never, ever stop.

Gendry had never been this hard in his entire life and willed himself to calm the fuck down.

Except Arya wasn't helping. "Don't hide it. You can't." She teased in his ear, unlacing his vest: "You're too big to hide."

Coyness, surely, a white lie — _she's a maid, no other men to compare_ — but seven bloody hells, Gendry took that compliment to heart. He must've blacked out for a second, because when he came around, his shirt hung open, chest bare, and Arya was kissing his clavicle, hard enough to bruise. Her nimble fingers trailed down his belly, quick and light as her waterdancing, to trace over sweat and muscle and coarse black curls.

She beelined for his belt, and if Gendry let her, then he was doomed to spend tonight balls-deep in the Princess of Winterfell.

Colossally bad idea. They'd an apocalypse to weather, zombies to burn. What if she got pregnant? What if he hurt her, and she hated him forever? Someday, tomorrow or fifty years from now, she'd regret wasting her maiden's gift on a nobody. He cared for her too fucking much to let that happen, and he'd kill any man who did.

Even though Gendry never wanted anything so much as to make love to Arya Stark, instead he caught her wrists and whispered: "Not today."

"Wha— why not?!" The God of Death pouted, honestly pouted, her petulance and fury so innately Arya. "You can't just— " She sounded a bit desperate, actually, hands helpless in his, grasping at nothing. Was he debased to like it? "That's not fair, Gendry." She nearly pitched a fit. "You can't leave me like this!"

He could, he should, and he would, dammit, if she'd quit squirming. "I don't stop now, I don't stop at all." His control stretched razor-thin.

As a Guildsman's trained to do, Arya saw her chance and ran with it. "Then don't stop. Never stop again." Quite an offer, and the sound she made, low in her throat, was pure temptation. "I dream of you," she confessed. "At your forge. I've dreamt of you since Harrenhal." Oh, how deeply and morally wrong, but that shot straight to his cock. She felt it. No way she didn't. "Don't tease me anymore. It's cruel, please— " Arya read him like a book, found the chink in his armor, and laid it on thick. "I ache inside, Gendry. It hurts. Help me."

 _You. little. faceless. siren._ Those pitiful looks, the simpering and whimpering, all expertly crafted to stroke his ego and shatter his will. She was so very clever about getting what she wanted, exactly when she wanted it, but Arya always valued honesty. Was he a fool to hope she spoke truth now? Might a brave and beautiful and deadly princess really dream of him, ache for him, love him in return?

Gendry felt himself sliding down an especially slippery slope. _I think I'm being seduced by Arya Stark._

"I'm ready for you." She pressed her forehead to his, biting her bottom lip. _Seven save me._ "I'm always ready for you. Hearing your hammer on steel makes me wet." Legs still around his waist, Arya was frantic, breathless, and playing him like a fiddle. "Please, just... fuck me a little?"

That didn't even make sense! But gods be good, maybe she trained with the Guild _and_ the courtesans in Braavos, because no woman had ever begged for anything so prettily since the Dawn Age. Gendry was only human, and surrender came in an avalanche when he heard himself breathe: "As m'lady commands."

 _You win, princess._ Per usual.

Gendry released her wrists, pressing his palms to her shoulders, easing her down. "Lay back." Her head thunked against his workbench, and she sobbed with relief and glee as he divested her boots and sword belt. "D'you know what the Lord's Kiss is?"

"I can guess." Now she'd gotten her way, a switch flipped, back to bold and curious and ever-hopeful Arya. "Something I'll like?"

"Aye, m'lady, you'll like it some." Better to show than tell, but best to ask. "All right if a tongue, not a cock, is my weapon of choice?" She inhaled sharply, jaw lax, breath quickening as Gendry knelt between her thighs and slowly unlaced her breeches. Forgotten on the floor nearby was Needle, the great instigator, and may every god in every pantheon bless that little sword. "D'you trust me?"

Grey eyes wide and pupils blown, Arya nodded. "With my life."

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

And at that exact instant, the Lady of Winterfell barged into the smithy like a bat out of hell. "Ravens from our front line. The Night King marches for Karhold, not Last Hearth." Scrolls and manifestos in hand, Sansa plowed through the door without looking up. "We rerouted the troops, and Dany and Jon will fly within the hour, but I looked everywhere and can't find Ary— oh, _fuck._ "

Arya had never heard her sister curse before, nor had she ever seen anyone look quite so startled. Which said a lot, because Walder Frey and Petyr Baelish were both pretty fucking startled there at the end.

Nobody said anything for a long moment, while Sansa stared agape at the well-ravished blacksmith on his knees before her sister. Though everyone's breeches were still on — near miss, that — Gendry was awash with shame. Clutching together the unlaced edges of his vest, he moved to stand; Arya hooked both legs over his shoulders, locking him in place.

"Devastating about Karhold." Arya sat up, calm as still water. "Unprepared as they were, we should send smiths to forge dragonsteel, and swordsmen to wield it." She winked down at Gendry, who buried his flaming face in his palms. "Shall we fly out with Jon or stay to defend Winterfell?"

Her sister was grinning from ear to ear, fixated on Gendry. "Uh, your choice, but Lady Alys needs all the help she can get."

"An hour, you said?" Sansa nodded, and Arya hummed thoughtfully. "We should be done in an hour."

Her sister tried not to laugh and did a terrible job. "Marvelous. I'll, er— send a raven ahead to the Karstarks." She was cackling overtly now. "Sorry to... interrupt. Do carry on." On her way out, Sansa stopped short. "Oh, and Master Baratheon?"

Red as a brick, still on his knees and framed by Arya's thighs, Gendry could scarcely meet her gaze.

Before closing the door behind her, Sansa reminded him it could've been worse: "Just be grateful I'm not Jon."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Somehow, my favorite part of this fic ended up being Sansa, the real MVP, who's stuck running the whole goddamn country while her siblings ogle their significant others.
> 
> I absolutely agonized over whether my writing had what it takes to pull off this forge!kiss with class and finesse. To clarify, in case I missed the mark, **Gendry initially said no only because he thinks he doesn't deserve Arya** and there was **no deception whatsoever from Arya during that 'seduction.'** Everything she feels about or says to Gendry is 100% true, as mentioned in her narratives. In essence, Arya did to him the polar opposite of what Melisandre did.


End file.
